Well, the lowly Oilers coming to town in another season of tanking it all in the name of a high first round draft pick. Nice work, Lowe, nice work Tambellini. It irritates me that the league rewards bad management with high draft picks, or it rewards management that is motivated to not right the ship cause of the all mighty high draft pick. That being said, whoever is the lead scout in Edmonton, or has been the head scout for the last decade should be fired. The Edmonton Oilers have not picked one defenseman with their 'First' overall pick since 2000, all forwards with ther first pick -

and in draft, 97, 98 and 99, they took forwards all in the top 15, Michael Reisen, Michael Henrich and Jan Rita.

Is it no wonder their defense sucks.

Now, you can't complain about the RNH, Hall, Eberle picks, those are great picks, although I like Seguin and Skinner better than Hall. Hall goes blind when he has the puck like David Booth and tries to blow by everybody like 'he could' in junior. Gagner is meh. Watching the Shark-Oil game last night, Ray Ferraro went on about how the Oilers can have all the great young forwards they like but it's not good if they have no defenseman to get them the puck.

The Coilers are going to get another top 3 pick this year, Tambellini seems to be doing a splendid job at not bringing in the proper veteren leadership to guide the youth, he's too focused on being top dog again a the draft and getting another high pick in 2012 instead of sacrificing some futures for a "lets start fucking winning' mentality. And when their time comes to pick, I guarantee you it won't be a defeseman, even in a draft where the top end of the first round is all defenseman, except for two russians and swede.

"I just want to say one word to you. Just one word. Are you listening? - Plastics." - The Graduate

We certainly deserved that one. I don't know how many posts we hit (I think it was 4 in regulation, 1 in the SO), but the Canucks dominated the game territorially. The Oilers kids look dangerous against our fourth line, but the Sedin cycle was putting on a clinic. Who the fuck does Andy Sutton think he is?!

One thing became painfully clear to me last night, David Booth can't stick handle.

And, where oh where is Ryan Kesler? Last season he looked like the second coming of Mike Modano. This year he's pulled a Bertuzzi. The only guy on that line that has a sense of looking to collaborate with their fellow line-mates is Chris Higgins. Something is afoul with the Kesler line, no chemistry.

I thought Janik Hansen was our best player last night. I do like our 3rd line or is it 2B now?

I think I might be wrong about Taylor Hall, this kid is going to be good along with that Eberle kid. Throw in RNH, this team is going to be scary one day, that is, if Tambellini gets his head out of his arse.

"I just want to say one word to you. Just one word. Are you listening? - Plastics." - The Graduate

RoyalDude wrote:And, where oh where is Ryan Kesler? Last season he looked like the second coming of Mike Modano. This year he's pulled a Bertuzzi. The only guy on that line that has a sense of looking to collaborate with their fellow line-mates is Chris Higgins. Something is afoul with the Kesler line, no chemistry.

Just in case you missed it, Kesler was the one who made the second goal happened. Also, if it is not for the post, he could easily have two-three assists.

RoyalDude wrote:I think I might be wrong about Taylor Hall, this kid is going to be good along with that Eberle kid. Throw in RNH, this team is going to be scary one day, that is, if Tambellini gets his head out of his arse.

It does not matter whether Tambellini can get his head out of his arse or not. The kids might not want to stay in Edmonton. Even if they do, the Oilers still have a hard time filling out the roster with quality FA.

It's obviously not at an elite level, and certainly not up to par compared to his line mate and fellow American Kesler, but I don't see a player who has trouble carrying the puck through the neutral zone, nor does he have many issues driving to the net with the puck on his stick or even making a move or two to get a shot off.

Booth is looking like the player the Panthers signed to that big extension, and by the summer, people will laugh when reminded that we gave up only Sturm and Samuelsson and somehow ended up coming away with a 3rd round pick as well.

I don't think we should expect Booth to be a flashy player who carries the puck on a string, because he's never been that type of player. He's an incredibly strong and determined player who flourishes in the corners, in-front of the net, backs off defences with his speed, drives the net and has a good, hard shot. He's basically everything the Canucks were lacking in their top 6.

For all the concerns about his defensive game, he's come a long way since he first joined the team. Last night, there were a few instances where he jumped passing lanes, back-checked hard and picked-up the open man on the wing to take away the cross-ice pass. These are little things that make players reliable in their own end, and Booth is improving in that aspect. The Canucks system that's often described as consisting of a "tight five-man unit" is beneficial for fast and aggressive forwards. The back-check and play in their own zone allows the speedy wingers to pick up speed through the neutral zone instead of just hanging back in the neutral zone and waiting for a pass from their own end.

I was getting extremely excited with the Booth-Kes combo before prayer boy decided to cut to go into the slot with his head down, but since returning they've picked up where they left off. I don't want to get ahead of myself, but seeing how well he fits this team and that 2nd line, there's no reason why he shouldn't be a consistent +30 goal scorer here.

What I think that 2nd line needs to work on is reading off one-another a bit better, and that will come with more familiarity. The more Booth keeps succeeding in-front of the net, the more the opposition will focus on preventing that from happen. Kesler has a wicked wrister, but so far this season it's been taken away with aggressive close-outs and convergence on Kes as he gets into the offensive zone in areas where his shot was effective last year, i.e. the high-slot, or just outside of it. What that's done is allow Booth to find seams to the net and has been able to win battles down-low. Once the defences start shifting back a bit, Kesler needs to find openings in that area and get his shot off more often.

We're still in the early stage of this 2nd line playing together, and all signs point to them being even much better down the road.